Mutual Agreement Procedure Statistics for 2016

The report on BEPS Action 14 (Making Dispute Resolution Mechanisms More Effective) contains a commitment by countries to implement a minimum standard to ensure that they resolve treaty-related disputes in a timely, effective and efficient manner. All members of the Inclusive Framework on BEPS (IF) commit to the implementation of the Action 14 minimum standard which includes timely and complete reporting of mutual agreement procedure (MAP) statistics pursuant to an agreed reporting framework. The 2016 MAP statistics are for the first time reported under this new framework. They cover all the members that joined the IF prior to 2017.

MAP statistics for reporting periods 2006 to 2015 are still available for OECD member countries and a number of non-OECD economies that have agreed to provide such statistics for these periods.

MAP Outcomes

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Cases started before or as from 1 January 2016

In the MAP Statistics Reporting Framework, a distinction is made between the cases that started before or as from 1 January 2016, which is the date as from when the reporting jurisdictions committed to the implementation of the Action 14 minimum standard.

The cases started before 1 January 2016 are cases that were in the inventory of the jurisdictions before they committed to the implementation of the Action 14 minimum standard. The number of cases in such category will decrease over time.

The cases started as from 1 January 2016 are cases that started after the jurisdictions committed to the implementation of the Action 14 minimum standard. The share of cases in such category will increase over time and eventually will cover all cases in a jurisdiction’s inventory.

The main differences between the two categories are the following:

Cases started before 1 January 2016

Cases started as from 1 January 2016

Each jurisdiction can follow its own computation rules

No reporting on a jurisdiction basis

No possibility to identify the cases that are reported twice by jurisdictions that have cases together

All reporting jurisdictions follow the computation rules set in the MAP Statistics Reporting Framework

Reporting on a jurisdiction-by-jurisdiction basis (aggregated for the publication of 2016 MAP statistics)

All cases initiated in one jurisdiction are also reported in the other jurisdiction involved

Possibility to avoid double counting by identifying the cases that the reporting jurisdictions have together

Transfer pricing cases and other cases

The agreed reporting framework now makes a distinction between "attribution/allocation" cases and "other" cases.

An attribution/allocation case (called here a "transfer pricing case") is a MAP case where the taxpayer’s MAP request relates to either:

the attribution of profits to a permanent establishment (see e.g. Article 7 of the OECD Model Tax Convention); or

Any MAP case that is not an attribution / allocation MAP case is considered as an "other" MAP case.

Note: while these definitions belong to the set of rules applicable for cases started as from 1 January 2016, the jurisdictions may have used different definitions for cases that started before 1 January 2016 and specify in the notes of their own statistics the definitions they have used. See also above for more details about the distinction between cases started before or as from 1 January 2016.

Note: the average time mentioned here only relates to cases that were closed in 2016. For cases started as from 1 January 2016, this means that maximum 12 months have elapsed from the start date to the end date of such cases.

Action 14 develops solutions to address obstacles that prevent countries from solving treaty-related disputes under MAP, via a minimum standard in this area as well as a number of best practices. It also includes arbitration as an option for willing countries.